Alexandre Cabanel: Fallen Angel and Academicism

the birth of modern art in the 19th century gave us what i believe to be some of the greatest works of art ever produced in the western world from van gogh to munc picasso and kalo modern art liberated artists allowing them to experiment with new ways of depicting the world new ways of thinking of art and new ways of expressing themselves as seen in my video on manes de genesoleb perhaps the first modern painting modern art first started from a refusal to comply with the rigid norms and requirements of academicism [Music] set by the european academies of fine arts or mostly by the french academy de bozar academicism had a very specific narrow and conservative vision of art to make a good work of academic art you need technique you need craftsmanship you need a lot of training your proportions must be perfect your brush strokes must remain invisible and your subject must be appropriate painting a nude contemporary woman on whoms skin we can see brush strokes was unacceptable not only does it not comply with the artistic standards set by the academy it undermines the academy's authority and here's an important thing to remember when talking about academicism the academy's authority pretty much every exhibition during the 19th century in france was held by the academy most notoriously the paris salon to become an established artist you had to go through the salon and therefore to become an established artist you had to be approved by the academy so the academy's authority was almost absolute in the art world not only in terms of setting artistic standards and norms but also in terms of deciding which artist is worthy of recognition the freedom we often associate with art was absent you couldn't be an artist if you hadn't completed years of formal training at an academy you couldn't be an accomplished artist if you weren't recognized by the academy modern artists manet and the impressionists especially subverted the academy's authority they waged a war against it and won thanks to modern artists academic conventions and its rigidity is now part of the past and we can now practice art freely a fan of modern art i'm very happy that the art world was able to get rid of its hierarchy and become more democratic more open to a broader diversity of expressions and styles but there's one thing that bothers me in our rejection of academic art we also rejected many academic artists extremely skilled devoted masters of the arts many of their names have been forgotten only remembered by art historians but invisible in our common understanding of art their current notoriety or anonymity doesn't match the popularity they once had i'm thinking of names like ernest messenger who erjando lacroix called the incontestable master of our epoch or william adolf bugro who is also considered one of the greatest painters of his time this video is an attempt at restoring one of these master's reputation in the public eye we'll be taking a brief look at alexander cabanese the fallen angel [Music] cabanel was a virtuoso the only evidence needed for this claim is this portrait of a 13 year old boy at first glance this portrait might look like your average portrait but it isn't this is a self-portrait made by cabanel at the age of thirteen in his twenties cabanel won many awards including the prestigious prieduram which gave him the opportunity to study renaissance masters in italy he quickly became one of the pair salon's favorites and even the emperor himself declared him his favorite painter the 1863 salon was an infamous one many paintings were refused including le de genesoleb which warranted the creation of a salon de refuse a salon dedicated to the refused paintings of the 1863 salon not only was cabanese the birth of venus accepted at this salon it became its main attraction napoleon iii himself would even end up buying it cabanel was one of the prime example of an accomplished academic painter he was part of the academy and was very often elected to be on the jury for the salons but although the birth of venus might be the painting cabinet is vaguely remembered for today it's far from being my favorite painting of his it's beautifully executed but it doesn't do much for me i much more prefer cabanel's 1847 fallen angel you see a young angel reclining yet contracting his muscles at the same time this depiction idealizes the subject a characteristic of academic art his wings are fading into a dark color as a handful of angels float in the sky above him but the one element of this painting which i absolutely love is the range of emotions in the angel's face without even knowing the context which pushed this angel in this situation you can tell he feels anguish anger and humiliation the fact that he's concealing his face with his arm should mean that he's also concealing some of his emotions but he's not his attempt at hiding his face shows us how shameful he's feeling his tear is a tear of both sadness and anger shame and humiliation pain and torment it's a beautiful depiction of the angel bilzeb who after rebelling against god was casted down from heaven john milton's 1667 paradise lost which tells the story of satan's failed rebellion and its subsequent consequences inspired this composition quite ironically when the young cabanet made this painting in 1847 he suffered the same fate as satan the academy didn't appreciate the fallen angel it criticized it both for its poor execution and its romantic style which displayed way too many emotions cabinet would write to his friend alfred that's my reward for all the trouble i gave myself not to submit an average piece of work i find cabanet's reaction fascinating because even though he would later embody the ideal academic artist he criticized the academy when he was younger he too once believed in a form of artistic liberty he in a way believed that the academy should be more flexible listen i'm not a huge fan of academic art i'll say it in cabernet's terms to me academicism created a lot of average pieces of work but academic artists can still remain interesting they too had talent they too had opinions they had ideas and visions these artists sadly had to evolve in a very narrow and rigid context with little space for experimentation but many of them still managed to move crowds some of them still managed to make a name for themselves even though they had little space to develop their own style and stand out from the many artists they competed with maybe cabanel and other academic artists didn't create the most innovative paintings and yes you might not find their paintings as enthralling as modern paintings but these artists made the most out of the little creative room they were given in a way cabanel and others had to push their creativity even further they had to go through the process of thinking how can my painting of a sleeping venus compete with the hundreds of sleeping venuses out there how can mine stand out but still comply to academic norms there is a kind of creativity in this process it might not be the same raw and free creativity that you might find let's say in a picasso or a kalo but it's what i would call a contained creativity a creativity that expresses itself not in its ability to stand out for itself but in its ability to stand out despite the limitations imposed on it cabanel and other academic artists were able to stand out because of this contained creativity and though we might not appreciate the restrictions imposed on them we must recognize the sheer talent of these artists who artistically evolved despite such limitations thank you so much for watching i'd like to thank you design i write and all my other patrons for supporting the channel if you want to join them in their support and get this 6x9 postcard print check out patreon.com forward slash the canvas

Channel: The Canvas

Views: 691,999

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Id: PXnKZ2JW3E0

Length: 9min 54sec (594 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 04 2021